Notes:
This was the 3rd year for this project. In 2014 it was billed as Will Bernard’s Blue Plate Review and occurred on Saturday of first weekend with Eric Kalb on drums. In 2015 it was billed as Will Bernard’s Blue Plate Special, on Thursday night, and cemented the lineup with Terence Higgins on drums. In 2016 it was Monday night and it was clear that Medeski was the leader of this group. They are going to record an album soon and start a kickstarter campaign. They also played a few European gigs in July of 2016.

Medeski, Martin & Wood began 2016 (their 25th year playing together!) with a handful of shows in Jamaica opening for moe. and Little Feat. Fortunately for us, Little Feat archivist Chris Cafiero was on hand filming the first three nights (of the four), and he even snagged soundboard audio patches each night. Another taper, Steve Wilner also filmed with cameras at both stage right and stage left, as well as front of house. These tapers graciously shared the raw files with me and now we can all enjoy all three nights in multi-camera glory. If you’re an MMW fan, get ready for 3 hours of couch tour! Did I mention that Chris is playing only his Fender Jazz bass for the whole run? Or that they bust out tons of old favorites and get into a large amount of tasty groove-based improvisation? I shouldn’t have to say anything else. But I will say cheers to #MMW25! We’re off to a great start and let’s hope they book a lot more gigs, including something in New Orleans for Jazz Fest!